Education And Training

Story By: by Elisabeth Harrison

A banner hanging in the auditorium at Cranston High School West. After a federal judge ordered it removed, the school covered the banner with plywood and a school flag.

Jessica Ahlquist has received threats since suing the school district over the banner.

In January, a federal judge ordered the banner removed. The school board is expected to decide Thursday whether to appeal.

The ruling has prompted an angry backlash from residents. Ahlquist has received death threats and has even been criticized by her own state representative, Peter Palumbo.

“What an evil little thing. Poor thing,” he told local talk radio station WPRO. “And it’s not her fault. She’s being … trained to be like that.”

The prayer, which opens with “Our Heavenly Father,” urges students to work hard, be good people and achieve in sports. It ends with “Amen.”

“It’s stupid,” says cheerleading coach Janine Hansen, a recent graduate of the school. “You have your opinions — cool, keep them to yourself. It’s four words in the whole prayer — four words. Like, stupid.”

The school board had the option of removing the four words, but decided not to. Many Cranston residents protested the idea of changing what has been part of the high school since the early ’60s. For now, the school has covered the banner with plywood and a school flag.

Ahlquist says the prayer made her feel alienated.

“I was really taken aback and a little bit hurt by it because it is entitled ‘School Prayer,’” Ahlquist says. “It really does kind of make you feel like you don’t belong if you don’t believe in a heavenly father.”

Ahlquist says she’s most troubled by Internet threats and what her classmates have been posting online.

Other Student Challenges To Prayer In Schools

Workman v. Greenwood Community School Corporation (2010): A U.S. District Court ruled that Indiana’s Greenwood High School could not allow a student-led prayer at the school’s commencement ceremony.

John Doe et al v. The School District of the City of Norfolk (2003): A Nebraska student sued after a school board member read a prayer at a graduation ceremony. The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the student’s First Amendment rights were not violated.

Santa Fe Independent School District v. Doe (2000): Students from Santa Fe, Texas, challenged the reading of prayers over the public address system before their school’s football games. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled the prayers violated the First Amendment.

“This one really upset me,” Ahlquist reads from a laptop. “‘This girl must be so unloved to want to get negative attention from everyone. Yeah, everyone talks about you ’cause you’re psycho.’”

Ahlquist had a police officer escorting her to class for a time, but requested the detail be called off when she felt it was only adding to the public scrutiny.

Rhode Island was founded upon the principles of religious freedom and separation of church and state. But the state also has the highest percentage of Catholics in the nation. And in Cranston, the state’s third largest city, everyone seems to be talking about the banner controversy.

A local florist has been selling T-shirts with a reproduction of the school prayer. As she buys two for her children, parent Marlene Palumbo says she thinks the prayer should stay.

“It’s freedom of speech. I really don’t feel as if there’s a concern with it. It’s not religious in any way at all,” Palumbo says. “I mean, the banner has been up there since my mother went there.”

Parent Nicole Pillozi agrees. But she questions the risk of spending hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees if Cranston loses the appeal.

“I don’t think it’s worth the money. Not when the city’s in trouble and people are in trouble and the taxes just keep going up, and it’s crazy,” Pillozi says. “However, it’s a staple of the school.”

That’s exactly the dilemma the Cranston school board will face as it votes on whether to appeal the judge’s ruling.

Digital station Jazz FM has apologised after what appeared to be part of a pornographic film soundtrack was broadcast during one of its shows.

Listeners to Mike Vitti's show on Saturday heard about five minutes of groaning in the background as music and adverts played.

A statement from Vitti was posted on the station's website on Monday.

"Please accept our profound and sincere apologies for any offence we may have caused," it read.

"Unfortunately we had an unauthorised access to the live feed on Jazz FM on Saturday 18 February at 7:15pm which resulted in a highly regrettable incident.

"Rest assured we have taken steps to ensure that there will be no repeat."

On his Twitter feed on Tuesday, Vitti – who is also head of programming – wrote: "I'm truly sorry but we have had a major hack into the feed.

"Engineers looking into it now, once again, profound apologies."

Vitti added that he would apologise on air on his next show.

He went on to tweet that he "was going to London after last week's fiasco. Not been in a good mood these last few days. Can't understand why someone would do that."

The station has an average weekly audience of about 500,000 and covers many jazz genres, including funky, Latin and big band.

Vitti's Funky Sensations show features such artists as Rick James, Teddy Pendergrass, George Duke, Booker T and Roy Ayers.

Story By: by Jim Zarroli

Birth control will be paid for by employees’ insurance companies, if their employers refuse to do so.

February 15, 2012

The argument that contraception services save money over time is an old one in family planning circles. Adam Sonfield of the Guttmacher Institute says it simply costs the health care system less money when couples plan their pregnancies.

“And that means healthier pregnancies and healthier infants,” he says. “It means fewer preterm births and low birth-weight baby births. It means starting prenatal care earlier. All those things also can lead to cost savings.”

Unplanned pregnancies also mean lost work time and lower productivity for employers, according to Sonfield. The insurance industry doesn’t really dispute that claim.

One industry official who didn’t want to be named said it’s clear contraceptive services save money over time or are at least cost neutral. But he’s worried about the White House compromise, anyway. He says insurance companies will be forced to put out a lot of money up front without getting reimbursed and that sets a dangerous precedent.

Insurance industry consultant Robert Laszewski says the problem is complicated by the fact that most employers and virtually all big companies self-insure. They pay their employees health care costs out of pocket every year. The insurance company is paid just to administer the plan. And it typically passes on its costs to the employers. Only in this case, it won’t be able to do that.

“The problem is the insurance plan is going to have to front about $360 per person who uses the birth control pill,” he says. “And the insurance company that does that will not be able to recoup any savings.”

This creates an almost unprecedented problem, according to Laszewski. Federal and state governments frequently order private companies to do things like put airbags in cars, he says. But those companies can charge more to make up the cost.

“I have never seen an example of the federal government telling a company they have to provide a service and they are not allowed to charge for it,” he says.

Insurance companies that administer these plans will have no choice but to try to find a way to pass on the immediate costs to their other customers, he says, even if no one wants to admit that’s happening. White House officials insist they can prevent that.

They also say the fact that the compromise has been embraced by some former critics, such as Catholic Charities and the Catholic Health Association, suggests it can succeed in the long run even if some details still have to be worked out.

Iraq, in an area once home to some of the earliest civilisations, became a battleground for competing forces after the US-led ousting of President Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Only three weeks after the start of the fighting, they had entered Baghdad, and the Iraqi leader's grip on power had withered. The majority Shia population, which had to a large extent been excluded from power, was initially jubilant.

However, optimism gradually gave way to despair as insurgent groups – mainly drawn from embittered Sunnis, dismissed army officers and supporters of the former regime – began an increasingly bloody campaign of bomb attacks.

The insurgents – with Al-Qaeda in Iraq among the most violent – targeted civilians as well as security forces, at times killing hundreds of people in one day. The conflict descended into near sectarian warfare in 2006-7 when Shia militant groups struck back with a campaign of kidnappings and killings.

The transfer of power to an interim Iraq government in June 2004, and seven months later, Iraq's first multi-party elections in 50 years, which brought an overwhelmingly Shia-dominated coalition to power, failed to stem the violence.

By 2008, however, a "surge" in US troop levels to confront the insurgents, the co-opting of moderate Sunni tribesmen in the struggle against militants and an improving Iraqi army had succeeded in turning the situation around. The number of attacks lessened, although sporadic attacks continue.

In June 2009 US troops withdrew from Iraq's towns and cities, handing over security to Iraqi forces. In line with a pledge by US President Barack Obama the last US combat troops left Iraq in August 2010. The last US troops left Iraq by the end of 2011.

Straddling the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and stretching from the Gulf to the Anti-Taurus Mountains, modern Iraq occupies roughly what was once ancient Mesopotamia, one of the cradles of human civilisation.

In the early Middle Ages, Iraq was the heartland of the Islamic Empire, but a brutal Mongol invasion in the 13th century destroyed its importance. Part of the Ottoman Empire from the 15th century, it came under British control after World War I, gaining independence in 1932.

The British-installed monarchy was toppled in 1958 and a coup in 1968 brought the Arab nationalist Ba'ath (Renaissance) party to power. Oil made the country rich, and when Saddam Hussein became president in 1979, petroleum made up 95% of its foreign exchange earnings.

But the 1989-88 war with Iran and the 1991 Gulf War, sparked by Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, together with the subsequent imposition of international sanctions, had a devastating effect on its economy and society.

What remained of the economy was largely shattered by the 2003 invasion and the subsequent violence. Attacks by insurgents on Iraq's oil infrastructure cost the country billions of dollars in lost revenues.

In the north, the Kurdish community has broken away to create a semi-autonomous region of its own.

Dubai: A man who recollects little about himself, following a severe head injury last year, is stranded at a government hospital, as authorities are yet to identify him.

Although doctors, nurses and staff at the hospital are overjoyed at the prospect of Lakshman getting back together with his family, the three-month long resident will be deeply missed as he has grown to become a "doctors pet", spreading joy around the otherwise dismal hospital environment.

"My name is Lakshman. My wife and four children are back home in Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, in India," 43-year-old Lakshman said, pausing and often shying away as he spoke to Gulf News on Wednesday.

That is most of what he remembers of himself.

Article continues below

Story By: by Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson

Egyptian Planning and International Cooperation Minister Faiza Aboul Naga (shown here in Washington, D.C., last April) has repeatedly warned Egyptians about the alleged danger foreigners pose to their country. She is the driving force behind recent efforts to prosecute 43 people, including American and other foreign democracy activists, for operating illegally in Egypt.

In Egypt, a female Cabinet minister has emerged as the driving force behind a crackdown on U.S.-funded pro-democracy groups.

The attacks of Faiza Aboul Naga — a holdover from the regime of ousted Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak — have made her a hero to many Egyptians who believe she is defending their country’s honor. But the threat she poses to billions of dollars in U.S. aid and international loans could make her power short-lived.

Aboul Naga, minister of planning and international cooperation, has warned Egyptians time and again about what she sees as the danger foreigners pose to her country.

During a recent press conference broadcast on state television, the 61-year-old said American aid has been used to shape politics in Egypt since last year’s revolution. That is something no country can allow, she said.

Such claims, which are now almost daily fodder in Egypt, are stoking widespread xenophobia.

Many foreign aid workers say they can’t understand why the woman who spent many years in the West has them in her sights.

Les Campbell is the Middle East and North Africa director for the National Democratic Institute, one of the groups under attack.

“I don’t think anyone really knows the exact reason. There are as many conspiracy theories as there are Egyptians,” he says. “I think probably the best explanation is that this is a distraction, perhaps, from the very serious problems that are facing the country.”

Those problems include a weakening economy, lack of services and rising crime.

Hossam Bahgat, who heads the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, says Aboul Naga is using the issue of nongovernmental organizations to enhance the image of the interim government.

“Her statements clearly show that she believes any work to promote democracy or to promote human rights for that matter is just a front for intelligence or espionage work,” Bahgat says.

As a result, 43 people — including many Americans and other foreigners working for pro-democracy groups — were charged with operating illegally in Egypt.

Those under investigation deny the charges. They say the training they’ve offered is standard fare for any developing democracy.

Aboul Naga filed the initial complaint that sparked the crackdown, says Campbell of the National Democratic Institute.

“So a dialogue, with her sitting down explaining how we work, the demand for our work, the partnership with Egyptians, would be very nice,” he says.

But Aboul Naga has refused to meet with them. She also declined to be interviewed for this story.

Her critics say she is pursuing an agenda first laid out by her friend and former boss, Mubarak, who did not like being dependent on the West.

Those involved in development in Egypt say Aboul Naga has for years sought complete control of Western aid to Egypt. They say she wanted to make Egyptian groups and projects dependent on her.

So the minister balked when American officials began funding pro-democracy and other programs directly, to the tune of $160 million in the past 12 months.

But many in Egypt fear what Aboul Naga is doing will backfire in the long run. They say desperately needed grants and loans hang in the balance.

Nora Soliman, a spokeswoman for Egypt’s Justice Party, says Aboul Naga is fueling paranoia among Egyptians.

“I see her as pursuing a scorched-earth policy for Egypt,” Soliman says. “You know, as Mubarak said before he left, ‘Apres moi le deluge’ — ‘It’ll be chaos when I leave.’ And she is the source of a great deal of this chaos right now.”

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: Feb 19, 2012 13:33
Updated: Feb 19, 2012 13:33

JAKARTA, Indonesia: A top Indonesian terror suspect captured in the Pakistani town where Osama Bin Laden was later killed insists he was unaware of the Al-Qaeda leader’s presence there, according to the video of his interrogation obtained by The Associated Press.

Alleged master bomb maker Umar Patek also described his frustration in re-establishing militant ties in his quest to go to Afghanistan and fight American soldiers. After flying on his own to Pakistan, he waited there for months before a years-old militant contact finally came for him.

His remarks, if true, would further bolster evidence that Southeast Asia’s Jemaah Islamiyah terrorist movement, responsible for the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings, is now largely cut off from its long-standing Al-Qaeda sponsorship, thanks in part to a relentless crackdown that has largely decimated their ranks.

Patek, whose trial resumes Monday in Jakarta for his alleged role in the Bali bombings that killed more than 200, was one of the last few remaining ranking Jemaah Islamiyah militants still on the run when Pakistani intelligence agents arrested him a year ago in the northwestern town of Abbottabad.

Although Jemaah Islamiyah is past its prime it is not vanquished, said Sidney Jones, a noted terrorism analyst from the International Crisis Group.

“Islamist radical groups in Southeast Asia, particularly those in the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia have been damaged but they are still dangerous,” she told the AP.

“They can stand their own ground. They are not linked to Al-Qaeda in any traditional way, but we have seen new waves of groups — to which Al-Qaeda is not connected at all — emerge and become more of a threat in Indonesia,” she said. “However, the Indonesian police in particular is managing the threat very well.”

Four months after Patek’s arrest, US Navy SEALS flew into Abbottabad and killed Bin Laden.

Patek’s arrest from a safe house so close to Bin Laden’s hide-out initially triggered speculation the terrorist leaders of Al-Qaeda and Jemaah Islamiyah in Southeast Asia were more connected that had been thought. Some Indonesian government officials had also hinted at a link.

US and Pakistani officials said that Patek’s presence in Abbottabad was a coincidence — and Patek’s own words seem to support that view.

The 30-minute video of the interrogation by Indonesian police in September on his return home shows the 45-year-old insisting he was in Pakistan on a personal mission to go to Afghanistan with his wife and conduct jihad there.

A smiling Patek, dressed in a white robe and a gold-white striped skull cap, says in the video: “This was a personal mission of mine to journey to Afghanistan. No one ordered me to, and I wasn’t out to build a new network.”

“It was pure coincidence that I was in the same town as Osama Bin Laden … It had to be God’s will.”

“All the time I was there, I stayed inside the house. In fact, I never left my room,” said Patek, who is accused of making the massive car bomb that struck two nightclubs on Bali’s famous Kuta beach, killing 202 people, mostly tourists.

Patek admitted to building the bomb during an earlier interrogation in Pakistan immediately after his arrest. He could face death by firing squad if convicted of various terrorism-related charges.

A top intelligence official in the Philippines cautioned that it was too early to conclude that Patek did not plan to hook up with Bin Laden in Pakistan, given that only Al-Qaeda had the resources Patek needed to pursue plans of setting up a new militant training camp, as he was suspected of seeking to do.

The official noted that most captured terrorists try to mislead investigators to protect themselves, their comrades and future plots.

Patek had shown intense passion for jihad, or holy war, in his homeland and in the southern Philippines, and it was strange that he would suddenly decide to go to an unfamiliar destination like Afghanistan, said the official, who was closely associated with the manhunt for Patek.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of a lack of authority to talk to reporters

Just before the 2002 bombings, Patek left Bali and went to a Muslim-dominated region of southern Philippines.

He told interrogators he came back several times from the Philippines to Indonesia to attend to family matters before deciding to travel to wage jihad in Afghanistan, flying first to Pakistan in August 2010.

“Some say I had fled … that’s not true. I never fled. I just migrated, merely to wage a holy war to help fellow Muslims who are oppressed in their lands … in the Philippines and Palestine,” Patek said in the video interrogation, this time with a straight face.

“If I knew how to go to Palestine, I might have gone there. But because I didn’t know how, I (intended to go) to Afghanistan through Pakistan.”

Patek told the interrogators that he wrote to a years-old e-mail contact of a Pakistani militant named Badar, whom he apparently had never met, asking for help to go to Afghanistan.

He’d originally gotten Badar’s e-mail address by his fellow radical, Imam Samudra, one of the masterminds of the Bali bombings, when both were in the Philippines. Samudra was convicted and executed in late 2008.

Relying on such an old contact suggests Patek had been unable to forge any new jihadist ties in recent years.

Patek said approached a Pakistani shopkeeper, Nadeem Akhtar, who helped him get a Pakistani business visa through his connections in the embassy in Jakarta.

Akhtar was deported from Indonesia on August 27, 2010, for overstaying his visa. Three days later, Patek and his Filipino wife followed, using forged passports and stayed in Akhtar’s house for two months. He later moved to the town of Multan to learn honey production and also got a visa extension for another three months.

During his five month stay in Pakistan, Patek said, he didn’t do anything except trade in honey while waiting for his militant contact, Badar, who finally came to pick him up from Multan.

Badar and another man who identified himself as Haidar, took Patek and his wife to Abbottabad in January 2011, he said. It is unclear which of Pakistan’s Islamist militant groups Badar and Haidar were part of.

They stayed in Haidar’s parents’ house in a room on the upper floor while waiting for the next stage of their journey to Afghanistan.

Nine days later, a squad of heavily armed Pakistani intelligence agents raided the house and captured Patek after shooting him in the thigh.

Post a comment